The Last Night
by Prospero's Pal
Summary: Malcolm and Reese spend one final night together before going their separate ways, mayhem ensues!


Reese Wilkerson had been in bed for hours but couldn't sleep. He grew tired of staring at the same spot on the wall and finally rolled over. He glanced at his brothers' bed and was surprised to see it was empty. He remembered that Dewey was away at music camp and figured Malcolm was in the bathroom. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep but his mind was buzzing with a million thoughts about how his life was about to change and how everything he knew was about to change radically, and forever. Tomorrow, Malcolm was getting on a plane to Boston to begin his education at Harvard. Tomorrow was also the day Reese began his new job as janitor at his old high school, and that afternoon after work, he would be moving in with Craig Feldspar. Reese thought that Malcolm was on his way to becoming rich and successful, a respected member of society. Reese also felt that he himself was on his way to ridicule at the hands of his former classmates. Ten years from now, his brother would probably own his own business and a million dollar house in the suburbs. Ten years from tonight, Reese thought, he would probably still be a janitor, be driving a crappy old car, and barely making enough money to cover rent at Craig's house. It was depressing.

When Malcolm had not returned after half an hour, Reese began to worry. He got out of bed and checked the bathroom, nobody was in there. He went to the living room and kitchen, the house was completely dark and there was no sign of his brother anywhere. Reese stared out of the glass doors leading to the backyard, it was too dark to see anything and he flipped on the outside lights. Nothing. No Malcolm. In a panic, he thought his brother might have completely freaked out over the pressure of going to Harvard and had actually run away. He considered waking his mom and dad but on a hunch he went to the front door and opened it. There he was, Malcolm was sitting on the front steps of the house wearing nothing but his underpants, a pair of light blue boxers that had seen better days.

Reese quietly stepped out on the front porch and gently closed the door behind him. He sat down next to his brother and like Malcolm, he was dressed only his underpants, but unlike Malcolm, his were brand new, a jet black pair of tight fitting boxer briefs. The two boys sat quietly together, not speaking, and not even exchanging glances. Malcolm stared down at his bare feet while Reese gazed straight ahead, focusing on the house across the street. Finally, Malcolm spoke.

"Reese, I have to tell you something." Neither boy moved, Malcolm was still looking down and Reese continued to stare straight ahead. After an awkward silence, Reese spoke up.

"I'm waiting butt munch, you gonna tell me something or not? We're sitting out here in the middle of the night in our goddamned underpants and you're playing mind games!" His words sounded unintentionally harsh. He was about to tell Malcolm he was sorry and he was cranky from lack of sleep but he didn't get the chance. Malcolm stood up quickly, staring down at his brother.

"Oh fuck you, Reese! I'm going back to bed."

"No, fuck you, Malcolm!" Reese stood and grabbed his younger brother by his arm, stopping him from going inside. "I've been up all night worried sick about tomorrow and all _you_ can think about is yourself! You are a selfish, self-absorbed, stuck-up, egotistical, obnoxious mama's boy that thinks the world revolves around your spoiled rotten little ass!"

Infuriated, Malcolm broke free of Reese's grip and tackled his older brother. For a short, skinny, non-athletic kid, he managed to deliver a pretty spectacular body check, sending both of them flying off the steps and onto the front lawn. Reese untangled himself from his brother's arms and legs and stood menacingly over him with fury in his eyes. "You little shit! I'm going to kill you!" He grabbed his brother by his hair and pulled him to his feet.

"Ow! Stop it, stop it! I hate you! I can't wait to leave your moron ass 2,000 miles behind and never have to see or smell you again! Let me go!" Malcolm swung his arms wildly and accidently connected with his brother's face. Reese stumbled backwards, tripped over his own feet, and fell hard right on his ass, ripping a huge hole in the back of his expensive new underwear. "Oh, shit!" Malcolm said to no one in particular and cowered, awaiting retribution.

Lois Wilkerson was awakened by blue and red flashing lights coming through her bedroom window. She was about to wake up Hal when the doorbell rang. "Oh dear lord what have those idiots done now?" She hastily put on her bathrobe and shook her husband awake. "Hal, Hal! Get up! The cops are here!" The doorbell rang again and again, followed by loud knocking. "Oh, keep your pants on! I'm coming," Lois screamed, as she made her way to the door. When she opened it she saw what she pretty much expected: Malcolm and Reese looking very embarrassed, and several annoyed cops.

"Do these two belong to you?" The officer who spoke, a tall, heavy-set man wearing sergeant's stripes, roughly shoved both boys towards Lois, causing them to stumble forward. One cop each grabbed the boys by the arms and held them tightly. "They were beating the hell out of each other on your front lawn, one of your neighbors called 911, she thought someone was being murdered." Both boys were a mess and somewhat indecent. Reese had the entire back end of his boxer-briefs ripped opened, exposing his ass to anyone who cared to see it. Malcolm's boxers were torn open at the fly, putting his junk on public display. Both of them had bloody noses and a variety of scrapes and bruises.

Hal had finally managed to get out of bed and appeared beside Lois, still trying to wake up. He pulled his robe together and tied the belt. "Officers? What on earth is this all about? What have you done to my boys? These are sweet kids, I'm sure they don't deserve to be manhandled like this!"

The sergeant rolled his eyes and suspected Hal was going to be difficult, so he decided to play it safe and be nice. "Sir, I was just explaining to your wife that these, um, sweet kids, were fighting in public, rolling around on your front lawn. _We_ did not do anything to them, except break up the fight before they killed each other. Now, if you two want to deal with them, we can release them to you right now and it won't go any further. If not, I'm afraid we are going to have to arrest them."

Lois screamed at the cops. "Arrest them? What for, you can't arrest brothers for fighting!" Hal nudged her to be quiet and said softly, "Now honey, that's no way to speak to the officers, we don't want the boys to go to jail do we?"

The sergeant had just about run out of patience with the entire Wilkerson clan. "Look, do you want them back or not? We can charge them with disturbing the peace, disorderly conduct, and indecent exposure."

"Indecent exposure?" Lois looked down at Malcolm's crotch and was horrified to see his dick hanging out of his torn underpants. "Good lord! Cover yourself!" Malcolm freed his arms from the cop who had been holding him and covered his junk with his hands. "OK, so that one, maybe, the other one isn't indecent!" The cop holding on to Reese spun him around so his parents could see his entire ass was exposed to the world.

"You idiots get in here right this instant! Move it!" Lois grabbed one boy with each arm and dragged them into the house. Hal was left at the door to deal with the cops. "Um, thank you officers, we'll deal with the situation, good night!"

The sergeant blocked Hal from closing the door with his arm. "Just to be clear, sir. These two are not children any longer and this type of behavior will not be tolerated. If anything like this happens again we are going to haul them off to jail and charge them as adults. Do you understand?" Hal nodded and waved goodbye as the cops returned to their cars.

After 45 minutes of screaming herself stupid, Lois took both boys into the bathroom and cleaned them up. Their noses had quit bleeding on their own and their other injuries were superficial. Once they were clean, Lois bopped each one of them on the forehead. "Now get to bed this instant and try not to act like savages!" The boys looked remorseful and started to walk away. "And put on some decent underwear for God's sake!"

Malcolm and Reese didn't say a word to each other. They put on fresh underpants and crawled into their beds. Malcolm turned off the lamp on his night stand and pulled the covers over his head. Reese did the same but he knew he couldn't sleep. He sat up in bed. Malcolm couldn't possibly be asleep already so he took a chance and spoke. "So, what was it you wanted to tell me, anyway?"

There was a weird noise coming from underneath Malcolm's covers. It sounded like someone was choking, wait, no, it sounded like sobbing. Reese felt like a total asshole for making his little brother cry on the last night they would be together in possibly a very long time. He got out of bed and gently sat down on the edge of Malcom's bed. "Jeez, butt munch, don't cry. I'm really sorry. This whole thing was my fault, I'm sorry buddy." Reese reached out and pulled the covers down exposing his brother's face, which had a huge grin on it. He hadn't been crying, he had been laughing.

"What the fuck, man, you think this is funny?" Reese was shocked and was convinced Malcolm was laughing at him. "Oh, go to hell, ass wipe!" The older boy returned to his own bed, crawled under the covers and turned his back to his brother.

"Dude, don't be mad." Malcolm was still laughing. He took a few deep breaths and went over and sat down next to Reese. "Listen, you asked me what I wanted to tell you before all hell broke loose." He started laughing again. Malcolm doubled over, trying to quiet down and catch his breath. Reese sat up, pulled off his covers and swung his legs over the side of the bed, sitting butt to butt next to his apparently brain damaged brother.

"Shut up man! If you wake up mom she's going to kill us for real this time!" Reese couldn't help himself. He watched Malcolm laughing like a madman and started to chuckle himself. "What is so damned funny? Did you hit your head out there? Do you have a concussion?" Malcolm erupted into a huge belly laugh. Reese was perplexed. "Butt munch, what the hell is so funny?"

Malcom pulled himself together, took several big, deep breaths, and sat quietly for a few seconds. He looked at Reese, making eye contact. "What I wanted to tell you was that I love you to death and I was going to miss the hell out of you!" Both boys broke into fresh rounds of laughter, collapsing backwards onto the bed, shaking uncontrollably as they laughed themselves sick. Reese managed to say that he was trying to think of a way to tell Malcolm the same thing, which of course set off even more laughing. Malcom summarized the situation. "So, we both tried to say we love each other and ended up in a huge fist fight!" Malcolm laughed harder. "Yeah, and almost got arrested," Reese added. The boys laughed like idiots until they fell asleep.

At 6:30 a.m. Lois knocked on the bedroom door. "Time to get up, boys! Are you awake?" When there was no answer Lois quietly entered the room. "Boys? Are you up yet?" What she saw shocked her. Her sons, who only a few hours ago had been trying to murder each other, were fast asleep, both of them in Reese's bed, laying on top of the covers. Malcolm was on his side, facing the room and Reese was snuggled up behind, with his arm wrapped tightly around his brother. Lois smiled and shook her head. "If I live to be a million years old, I will never, ever understand boys!"


End file.
